ABSTRACT
During the late 1800s and early in the 1900s there were great changes happening in Europe: the beginning of the Industrial Revolution brought about the first electric light, travelling took place by car and airplane, cinema, telephone and telegraph changed the way people communicated with each other, travellers were able to publish photographs of their journeys, and scientists focused their attention on movement, matter and overcoming the forces of nature. This was the beginning of the ‘modern (materialist) age’ when mankind no longer separated science and religion, knowledge and faith, matter and spirit – all these things were now open for discussion, and ‘free thinkers’ developed who took these discussions into different dimensions: Einstein, Darwin, Tolstoy, Marx, Freud. The world was full of intellectuals, artists, dramatists, thinkers, politicians, scientists and explorers. It was an exciting time in which to be born.
